In defense of Paul Seely

Janice cites JP Holding himself, to deny Paul Seely's claim that Holding is
a creationist (ie, a YEC). Here are my comments about this.

(1) The article by Holding that attack's Seely's very well argued position
on the shape of the earth in the Hebrew Bible (Does the Bible say Earth is
Flat?), was printed by a YEC journal. This does not prove that Holding
himself is a YEC, of course--one could write an article of interest to YEC
readers, and publish the article in that particular journal, without
necessarily endorsing YEC views all around. I can imagine, e.g., that
someone might be allowed perhaps (I say perhaps) to publish an article
*attacking* certain YEC views in a creationist journal--in which case it
would very likely be accompanied by article(s) refuting the attack--and that
the author of such an article might not be a YEC herself. But the article
by Holding is not of this type, and I think we may presume reasonably that
he is happy to associate himself with the YEC position--or at least he has
no wish to dissociate himself from it, despite the prima facie evidence
(from this article) that he is a YEC himself. This counts for something,
short of proof.

(2) The article itself contains this sentence:

"Thus far, this is all quite acceptable within a creationist paradigm, as
we will demonstrate."

Once again, this could be consistent with the views of an author who is not
necessarily committed to YEC, but who recognizes that he is writing for a
YEC journal and wants to connect with his audience. It is more natural,
however, to read this as more than just a point of connection, but (esp in
this journal) as a defense of the larger YEC position on science and the
Bible.

This counts for something, short of proof.

(3) This particular issue--the earth's shape--is a scientific one, and the
YEC position is that whenever the Bible speaks about scientific matters it
does so either in a way that is itself fully scientific (ie, fully
consistent in detail with universally accepted matters of science, such as
the earth's sphericity), or else (in those cases where the Bible actually
does seem to contradict universally accepted matters of science, such as the
earth's motion around the sun) that the Bible sometimes does speak
phenomenally about such things, so that the words are not literally true but
they are still true about what *appears* to the senses of the terrestrial
observer.

The standard YEC approach on this issue is to claim that the Bible
*actually teaches* the earth's sphericity, thus providing one (of what they
would say are a large number of) example(s) of the presence of modern
scientific truth being found in the Biblical text. Some OECs have
done/still now do similar things; e.g., Harry Rimmer used the Bible in this
way all the time, claiming to find references to atomic theory and the wave
theory of light (e.g.) in various biblical texts--utter nonsense, IMO, but
utter nonsense never stopped Rimmer from saying things. And Hugh Ross
likewise seems to do this from time to time. The fact that Holding seems to
be so worked up about this suggests to me that he really does want the Bible
to be fully accurate scientifically, which further suggests that he is a YEC
(though perhaps like Rimmer and Ross he is not).

(4) The comments Janet quoted from Holding now invite my further comment:

 I respect the knowledge of
those more informed than I am (as in the hard
sciences) and do not presume to know their stuff better than they do. ...

..The reason I do not buy or sell the evolution
story is that while I cannot comment upon the
"hard science" issues, when it comes to things I
do know, it is all too clear that the strongest
promoters of evolutionary theory could simply not
reason their way out of a paper bag, even one
with arrows painted inside in bright neon and a
tour guide pointing to the exit. I obviously do
not have the science knowledge to know whether or
not evolution is true. .." ~ J.P.
Holding http://www.tektonics.org/af/evologic.html

***

I begin by noting that Holding is explaining to people why he does not
write about evolution per se: namely, he don't know diddly about it. I
respect both the intellectual honesty and the spirit behind it. As Galileo
pointed out, one of the differences between genuine science and
pseudo-science is that genuine scientists admit to what they do not know. I
hope I conform to that maxim myself, even though I am not a scientist. I
strongly reject Holding's opinion that "the strongest promoters of
evolutionary theory could simply not reason their way out of a paper bag,"
but that's beside the point. (I've met some evolutionists who fit this
category, and I've met some biblical scholars who also fit this category.
Also beside the point.)

But Holding is simply saying here that he won't write directly about
evolution, not that he is not a YEC. The words she quoted (at least) say
nothing at all about the OEC/YEC argument. Holding simply says that he
won't discuss evolution--except by implication to deny it vociferously, by
the collective ad hominem that I quoted above. Everything he says here is
perfectly consistent with his being a YEC, though (again) it falls short of
proof.

In my experience--and I do have extensive experience on this issue (which
does not make me always right) -- Holding's posture on this in the passage
quoted, and his overall apparent avoidance of the age issue, places him
pretty close to the two men who defend "the 24 hour View" in the book, "The
G3N3S1S Debate." I mean Ligon Duncan and David Hall, a couple of PCA
ministers. They expressly deny that their view is equivalent to the YEC
view, despite the fact that they also expressly (and with much vehemence)
deny the orthodoxy of any other view than their own. They too do not know
the science issues, and do their best to avoid them; but they also make very
similar collective ad hominem statements about those Christians who think
that modern (ie, post-1800) science really has anything truthful to say
about the history of the earth and the universe. It's self-evident to the
informed reader that the authors are YECs by another name, and I find their
denial of it to border on the disingenuous.

My *sense* in reading Holding is that he does hold a YEC view and simply
does not want to defend his view scientifically. My sense is well short of
proof. But the "denial" Janet quoted is not a denial, it's an explanation
of why he won't discuss evolution directly. It is a good bit shorter of
proof that he is not a YEC.

Holding also endorses TheologyWeb (I don't know whether or not he's
officially connected with it), which absolutely does promote a YEC view,
though they allow most posts on other sides of the issue to be read. Thus
if Holding has a view on this, it's likely to be YEC.

(5) Holding flatly denies that there are two creation accounts, despite the
radical break one finds in Hebrew between the two accounts (yes, that's what
they are). This further suggests that he's a YEC, it might even be the
strongest evidence of it. In general, I'm not impressed with any of the
arguments he's made in response to Seely or on the issue of two creation
accounts. Just as I am not impressed with the gymnastics that YEC's
typically display when they say that that the Bible DOES teach the earth's
sphericity but does NOT teach that the earth is at rest. There is just no
coherence on that line of argument.

(6) I have begun to encounter a fairly large number of "agnostics" on this
issue of the earth's age, including at least one with a doctorate in biology
or biophysics. Eveyone I could name (but won't) in this category is an ID
supporter--how convenient, given the "big tent" that ID is. With Michael
Roberts, I am convinced that it's the historical sciences that present the
biggest challenge to ID, and that esp geology presents challanges to their
public posture about avoiding claims about the earth's age. IN EVERY SINGLE
CASE that I could name here, the "agnostic" individual realizes that the
scientific evidence for great age is very strong, but that theological
considerations (esp theodicy but also fears about the "materialism"
associated with evolution) prevent them from clearly accepting the
conclusion that the evidence leads most naturally to. I do sometimes chide
them, using the ID mantra, "follow the evidence wherever it leads." I do
sense that Holding might perhaps be in this category, in which case (IMO) he
might well have a faith crisis if he looks further into the details of the
science. But I speculate more than I have above, and I'll cease.

I think we are justified to regard Holding as a YEC. We don't have proof,
but then we didn't have proof that Scott Peterson killed his wife,
either--nevertheless, he almost certainly did, and I'd have voted that way
on the jury.

Ted
Received on Tue Jun 6 13:15:51 2006